Case 503

by Shiralyn J. Lee

  ‘God Kate, don’t you know how dangerous that is,’ I mumbled to myself.

  I walked into the bathroom where I saw her situated inside the glass cubicle standing beneath the hot steamy spraying water. I watched her for a moment whilst she washed herself down, her one hand touching her arm as she lathered herself up and then moving over to her stomach and then her thighs. She had no idea how sensual she looked just by doing this act.

  I undressed without her knowing that I was there and then I joined her.

  “Paige, I didn’t know you were home,” she giggled. The water was running in streams down her face and catching her eyes, causing her make up to run and her to blink constantly.

  “I’m sorry that I took so long.”

  “No, I’m sorry that I had a tantrum.” She stood up on her toes and gave me a gentle kiss on the end of my nose and then wiped a handful of white foamy bubbles on the top of my head.

  “I deserve that,” I laughed back.

  She gazed at me, with eyes bigger than I’d seen before and biting her lower lip, she moved towards me taking both of my hands and lifting them above my head.

  “Leave them there,” she whispered.

  I did as she told me.

  She began to kiss my neck, the warm water was running onto my hands, down my arms and my head, rolling down my face and then onto hers, causing her eye makeup to run down her cheeks even further. She shifted down to my breasts, kissing my soaked skin, tenderly. She picked up the sponge and coated it with an aromatic gel and began circling it over my body. Starting with my shoulders, she gently worked the later, taking it down each arm and then back up again. Next, she cleansed my breasts, paying particular attention to my nipples, keeping them erect and me, excited. She worked her way down over my stomach and then washed the tops of my thighs, my butt and the back of my calves.

  I closed my eyes. Her mere touch had turned me on. The water rinsed away the foam and I felt her hands on my hips, encouraging me to turn around and face away from her. My forehead pressed against the wet glass whilst I enjoyed the gentle contact from the light strokes of her fingers as she stood behind me teasing and caressing my butt.

  One of her hands slipped between my inner thighs and parted my legs. I felt her breasts press into my back as she kissed my shoulder blades. Her fingers entered me, fucking me slowly.

  It was hard to catch my breath with the water cascading down on me. Kate’s thrusts got faster and penetrated my insides deeper, stimulating my arousal. I began to grunt with each drive, wanting it harder than the last forceful push.

  She brought her other hand around to my front, placing her finger over my clit, rotating it gently. My insides were ravenous, greedy for the end result.

  “Come for me, baby,” she said, her voice low and sensual.

  I tilted my head back. My thoughts began to concentrate on her physical touch, tormented by her thrusts and teased by her fingers. Confused by which act pleasured me more, my body gave in and I released my orgasm on command. I cried out a yell of ecstasy.

  My head was still rested against the glass wall, and without warning tears emerged, forming large pools that stung my eyes, bringing me straight back to reality.

  “Hey, babe, is everything alright?” Kate asked. She stroked my back softly and then turned me around to face her. I could hardly look at her directly. “I can tell that you’re really stressed.”

  “I know, I’m sorry, Kate. I shouldn’t be feeling like this, it’s just that it’s been a long day.”

  She held me in her arms. For some strange reason, whenever she touched me lately, she made all my tension melt away. No one else could possess the power to do that.

  “We are ok, aren’t we?” she asked, pulling away from me slightly.

  “I couldn’t do half of the things that I do, without you in my life,” I quickly replied and pulled her back to me. I buried my head into her shoulder and began to cry without being able to explain it.

  Chapter Four

  “Your phone’s ringing, babe, are you going to answer it?” Kate asked, rolling over in bed to face me. She snuggled into my armpit, making it harder for me to reach out to grab my phone from the night stand. I didn’t mind, she was worth it.

  “Hi, Emily, why are you calling me so early?”

  ‘I’ve just spoken to Richard. A girl has recently been reported missing,’ she said. Her voice was fast with a tone of heightened excitement in it.

  “Any idea who she is?”

  ‘Richard’s sending me the info to my email, I’ll forward it to you in a minute.’

  “Ok,” I said, still half asleep. “What time is it anyway?”

  ‘6.25, am I interrupting anything?’ she sniggered.

  “No, no, nothing like that.” I rubbed my eyes, then double checked the time on my watch that I’d put in the top drawer of the night stand. “I’m getting up now.”

  Kate looked up at me and the expression on her face told me that she wasn’t impressed with me being so obliging toward Emily.

  ‘Email’s arrived; I’m forwarding it to you now,’ Emily informed me.

  “Ok, I’ll get up and take a look. Speak to you in a while.”

  “So Emily calls and you jump,” Kate mocked.

  “I only have eyes for you.” I tickled her in her ribs before planting a sensual kiss on her lips.

  “I’ll make the coffee,” she said affectionately.

  ♦♦♦

  Opening up my email from Emily, Kate stood behind me to see what she had sent. Normally I wouldn’t allow her to be privy to anything that was to do with work, but with our relationship freshly coming out of its rocky turmoil, I thought that it would be better not to rock the boat.

  She sipped on her coffee as I read the message.

  Melissa Bowden from Sacremento, aged 24, 5ft 6inches, long brown hair, blue eyes. Last seen, wearing a dark brown top, jeans and sandals. She was driving a dark blue 2012 Ford Taurus. She was reported missing late last night. Her boyfriend, David Moody, had arranged to meet with her in the evening and when she didn’t show up, he began to get worried. He called everyone who he thought that she might be with. The last person to see her was her best friend, Lee-Anne Walker. That was two days ago.

  A recent photograph showed a woman in her early twenties, glossy hair parted on the side, straight at the top leading down to waves at the end. Her lips were red and her cheekbones shined from the camera flash reflecting on her makeup. She was a beautiful woman, depicting a lot of confidence.

  “So what did she do?” Kate asked, peeking over my shoulder to get a better look.

  “She’s missing, possibly a murder victim.”

  “Oh god, that’s awful.”

  I called Emily back. “Get the boyfriend’s address, he could be a possible suspect, and get Lee-Anne Walker’s address too. Has Richard put out an APB on the car, and have they sent for a DNA test to see if she matches the body parts found?”

  ‘Yes, he’s on it now. It looks like we’re looking at a possible homicide.’

  “Pick me up as soon as you’re done.”

  ‘Sure, I’ll be there in an hour.’

  When I ended my call, Kate threw her arms around my neck, almost spilling her coffee over me. She peered round at me with an expression of concern.

  “I know your job is dangerous and I know it involves a lot cases that would make my stomach turn. How on earth do you do it, how do you keep going after you’ve seen a victim like this, hoping that they’re still alive only to find their dead body somewhere?”

  “It’s complicated, hun. I guess that I have been through so much in my life that I’ve become numb to it. The first few times, I think I cried for weeks after, I even had nightmares, but it became repetitive.”

  “I love you, babe,” she said and then quickly kissed me on my cheek.

  “I love you too.”

  Emily showed up just over an hour later. I could tell that Kate was reluctant to be accommodating toward her, but she did offer he
r a coffee just to please me.

  “Kate, you’ve really done a nice job with the place,” Emily said, trying to make polite conversation. I’d never told her about Kate’s jealous raves but I’m sure she could feel the tension whenever she was around.

  “I try,” Kate answered back smugly.

  “Ok, Kate, I’ll see you later. We’ve got to go now.”

  “Bye, babe. And, Emily, bring her home safely.”

  We headed for Granite Bay. It was a 2 hour drive to Melissa Bowden’s parent’s house. By now they would have been informed that their daughter is missing. This was the part of the job that we loathed.

  We took the I-680 and exited toward Redding, taking us directly to our destination.

  “Kate looks good,” Emily suddenly commented.

  “Yes she does, I’m glad that we’ve made the effort to save our relationship.” I gave a half smile as I thought about Kate and how close I’d come to losing her.

  “The search team didn’t find anything else at the site,” Emily informed me.

  I wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing.

  We arrived at the Bowden residence, Abbey Hill, Granite Bay. The concrete driveway with a brick wall sustaining a flower bed and shrubbery, led directly off the road and up to a 2 level biscuit colored house. Twin pillars supported the porch over the front door area with pebble dash steps leading the way beneath.

  I rang the doorbell and we both waited for someone to answer.

  “Hello, can I help you?” a woman with shoulder length blonde hair in her late forties asked as she opened the door. Her gray eyes stared at us, waiting for an answer.

  “I’m agent Bleu and this is agent Swanson.” I showed her my ID to confirm that we were on legitimate business.

  “Oh please come in,” she said quite meekly.

  She showed us through to the family room. Everything was pristine. Silver framed photo’s sat on the mantel above the fireplace. Beige brocade curtains made from heavy silk, draped across the patio window. A coffee colored couch dressed with plump chocolate brown cushions matched a supporting arm chair.

  “Please sit down,” she offered. “Can I get you some coffee or tea?”

  “No thank you, Mrs. Bowden,” I declined. With a heavy sigh, I asked, “Could we have a recent photograph of your daughter and also a hair brush that hasn’t been washed?”

  “A hair brush, why on earth…” she had a sudden look of realization about her.

  “We do understand that this must be very hard for you and your husband, and we’ll do everything that we possibly can, to find your daughter. Can you tell us where your husband is right now?” Emily asked her, sympathetically.

  “He’s away on business, in London to be precise. I spoke to him last night after David called me to tell me that she was…” she broke down mentally and began to cry, cradling herself in the chair. “My husband’s very distressed, you know.”

  “It’s all right, Mrs. Bowden, we’ll find her,” I told her. One thing for sure was that I couldn’t guarantee that she would still be alive.

  “Thank you,” she barely managed to say. She got up from the chair and pulled a handkerchief out from her sweater sleeve. She giggled nervously and said, “It’s funny, I always told Melissa not to put her handkerchief inside her sleeve, just in case she dropped it, silly really.”

  “Not at all, Mrs. Bowden,” I commented with an understanding to her state of mind.

  She picked up one of the photographs from the mantel and removed it from the frame.

  “I’ll just go and get her hairbrush from her room.” She gave me the picture of her daughter, pressing it hard against my chest.

  “Thank you, Mrs. Bowden. Would you mind if we came with you, just to have a quick look around? You never know, we may come across something that’ll tell us where she is. We’ll do everything that we can to find her,” Emily said, patting the woman’s arm. “Is there anyone else that you can think of, who she could possibly be with, any of her friends that may have been overlooked?”

  “No, not that I can think of. I went through all of her friends names with David. He seemed quite frantic when I spoke to him.”

  We followed her up the stairs to Melissa’s room. It was very feminine in appearance, neat and tidy with cuddly soft toys perfectly placed on her bed pillows. She was obviously a lover of the color pink. All the soft furnishings were a shade of magenta, the fluffy rug, a light pink, the walls, pink.

  We searched carefully through her personal belongings, quickly scanned through her diary to see if any names had been mentioned without her mother being aware that these people existed. She watched us, awkwardly trying to offer any information about her daughter.

  Nothing seemed to be out of place. We thanked her for being so patient and then retreated to the family room.

  “Here’s my card. You can reach either myself, or Emily at this number. Please call us, even if it seems trivial to you.”

  She took the card from me and tucked it into the empty picture frame and then placed it back on to the mantel where it sat before.

  “We’ll see ourselves out, Mrs. Bowden, and thank you for your time. We’ll be in touch.” I shook her hand and then we both left the house.

  “I hate having to act as though everything is going to turn out with a happy ending, when deep down I know that we are looking at a murder case,” Emily mentioned as she started the car.

  I nodded my head in agreement.

  Our next step was to visit David Moody’s residence. Although he had called the police to report his girlfriend missing, I wasn’t about to pass him up as a suspect just yet.

  Chapter Five

  We drove to Sunrise Blvd, Citrus Heights. It was ten minutes from Melissa’s house.

  David Moody’s father answered the door. He was aware of the situation and had apparently been helping his son in his search for his girlfriend. I took an immediate disliking to him. His behavior toward our investigation was no less than arrogant. He was a tall man with quite an intimidating personality. His hair was graying at the sides, he wore frameless glasses; they actually aged him.

  “So have you searched the area, have you found any clues, do you overpaid pen pushers know anything?” he ranted.

  “We’re here to speak to your son, Mr. Moody. Would you please inform him that we are here,” Emily firmly remarked.

  “David! David! There are two FBI agents here to speak with you,” he yelled up to the ceiling.

  A rush of footsteps above us could be heard as David came running out of his room and down the stairs. His face was flush, his eyes red from lack of sleep, stubble was beginning to grow on his lower jaw area. He was a 21 year old with a lot of weight on his shoulders right now.

  “Have you found her, is she all right? I’m going out of my mind with worry, please tell me you’ve found her,” he pleaded.

  “No we haven’t found her yet. We need to know exactly when you saw her last,” I told him.

  “If you’re going to be accusing my son of anything, then I’ll suggest that you can wait with that line of questioning when he has a lawyer at his side.”

  “Mr. Moody, your son has not been accused of anything, we are merely doing our investigation and we have to eliminate any possible avenues that may have caused Melissa to disappear on her own account. We cannot however, rule out anything that may also have led up to her going missing. Now if we can all stay calm, Emily can write down any useful information that David may have to help lead us to where she is.”

  “She hasn’t answered any of my calls or text messages. I have called just about everyone she knows to ask if they have seen her. She has never done this before,” he said desolately.

  “And what about her best friend Lee-Anne Walker? She was reported as the last person to see her,” I asked him, looking directly into his tear filled eyes.

  “That was Wednesday night. She told me that Melissa left her house around 8.30pm. She doesn’t live too far from Melissa’s hou
se, so she walked home.”

  “Have you or Lee-Anne had any kind of falling out with Melissa, have there been any underlying problems that may have arisen?” I asked him.

  “If you are insinuating that my son or Lee-Anne have had anything to do with…” he said angrily.

  “Mr. Moody, please refrain from these outbursts, we are here to speak with your son and if necessary we will have him questioned down at the Sheriff’s office. Which would you prefer sir?” I slammed.

  We were interrupted by Mrs. Moody entering the room. She was a frail looking woman and had been asleep in her room upstairs when she heard the commotion.

  “What’s going on John, who are these people?” she asked, timidly.

  “It’s ok dear, these ladies are here to speak with David, about Melissa, there’s nothing to worry about,” he said calmly to her.

  He showed her to an arm chair by the fireplace and helped her to sit in it.

  “Why is everyone standing up, I can’t get a good look at you all?” she said.

  “Please, everyone sit down,” Mr. Moody requested, respectfully for his wife.

  I sat on the couch next to Emily, David sat in a wooden dining chair that he had pulled out from beneath the large dark oak table and Mr. Moody sat in the other arm chair, opposite his wife. His entire attitude had changed since she had been in his presence. I found him to be a controlling bully toward his son and lacking respect for any authority figure.

  “David, we’ll need to search your room, can you take us there please,” I asked, knowing that his father would have to stay at his wife’s side.

  David took us to his room. For a 21 year old, the room still had an immature feel to it.

  “I’m away at college most of the time. My father didn’t want to have anyone in the house to decorate, not with my mother’s condition as it is,” he informed us.

  “And what condition would that be?” Emily asked him.

  “She forgets things. My father refuses to take her to a doctor to be diagnosed. I don’t argue with him about it, he’ll just get infuriated with me and yell what he usually yells at me, to get out of this house and never come back. I left for three weeks the last time he did that. He was only sorry because my mother kept asking where I was and it became a burden for him to lie about me.”